continuous learning, employee engagement, onboarding

Employee Education – We Can Do Better

You’ve got one, maybe two LMS superstars, the employees who wait for the arrival of a new offering as if it were the latest iPhone. But everyone else? They’re most likely using it when required for onboarding or mandated training and that’s about it.

It’s not just your company that’s in this position either. According to Forbes, 46% of professionals don’t even log into their corporate learning system more than once per year.

Before you blame the employees, assuming that they are just not motivated or invested enough in the business to want to engage in that way, consider your LMS. The traditional LMS is essentially obsolete. It’s a rigid, unwieldy relic of a bygone era. Granted there was a time when that type of LMS served a purpose. That time though, has passed.

It’s not just your LMS that needs a second look though. It’s the content it holds. Hour-long onboarding courses are outmoded as is taking an afternoon to work through the latest new skills initiative. In the work environment that is today’s reality, employees need agile training that can happen quickly and constantly.

There is a better way to share learning and knowledge

Employees are your largest expense. Making a commitment to their learning and retention is key to realizing a return on that investment.

So, what do you do? There are two options really. And “in-person training” isn’t one of them.

Sending employees to a multi-day conference has become a waste of time and resources. It’s cost-prohibitive to train everyone that way and for those that go, the trip often boils down to the free happy hours and taking just enough notes to get through the certification. That leaves:

Option 1. If you’re experiencing a less-than desired participation rate with your LMS, and you still have time left on your contract, you could look to making adjustments to the content (see Increase Engagement In 3 Simple Steps) for the time remaining.

Option 2.If you have the flexibility to choose another LMS vendor, do it. Your employees want something new and different that looks and feels like the platforms they use outside of work. Think Youtube, iTunes, Linkedin, Facebook. These “tools” have, in a way, conditioned employees to expect information in bite-sized nuggets, searchable, and context specific. The basic tenants of social media, those pieces that make those outlets a seemingly vital part of our daily lives can be translated to a learning application.

Learning needs an update

The greatest source of knowledge in your company – your employees of course. They’re a wealth of information, but which employee knows which processes? In whose head does the legacy knowledge live? How much key knowledge leaves with an employee on their last day?

You can see that it’s not enough to just identify the answers to these questions, you have to have a plan to act. How can you capture all of the information that is out there? How can you catalogue the direct knowledge that an employee has developed around the best way to perform their job? How do you prevent repetition and redundancy with your current learning system?

The solution is not mind blowing.

You need a well thought-out platform that becomes habitual to use and a go-to resource for the entire organization. It’s relevancy comes from having the employees willingly help with this solution and be actively engaged in the process.

StepItUp encapsulates the now of learning. A place where employees can instantly get the information they need in a social and searchable manner. Giving your employees the information they need, when they need it, in the way that they want it, fosters and encourages engagement.

As they learn, it becomes easier to support them with the rewards and recognition they desire. You can also link it to other metrics like onboarding, retention, engagement, customer satisfaction, and revenue to manage ROI.